Household #103: Pace, William H. Sr.

Back to the 1900 Census & Household Index

In the 1900 Barney census, William Pace headed a 3-person household. The table below preserves the exact names, relationships, ages, birthplaces, and occupations recorded for the household.

Household Snapshot

William Pace headed a 3-person household in the 1900 Barney census with 1 spouse or marital partner and 1 child.

William Pace's listed occupation was Farmer.

All listed household members were reported as born in Georgia.

Newspaper and Public-Record Trail

This section flags public-record leads separate from the census table. The detailed discussion stays in the family narrative, research status, and source citations below.

• Possible Pace-network newspaper references: Three 1903 "hideous monster" / "inland sea serpent" articles name Buck Pace of Barney as the first person to see the reported creature near Little River/Cecil. A 1901 Valdosta Times article on a body found in Little River also says Bailiff Pace at Barney had arrested Eli/Dave Dodson before the reported lynching. These items place Pace-named men in the Barney/Little River area, but neither article gives a first legal name, wife, child, age, or other bridge proving whether Buck Pace or Bailiff Pace was William H. Pace Sr. of this household, William H. Pace Jr. of HH#11, or another local Pace.

1900 Census Household

Children and Later Trails

This section is reserved for later-life child evidence. No later spouse, death, burial, obituary, probate, separate household, or descendant-line identification has been added here yet from direct records.

Family Narrative

• Property status: Farm owned free of mortgage in 1900
• First marriage: William H. Pace and Susan Foster, married 8 Jun 1858 in Muscogee County, Georgia
• Second marriage: William H. Pace and Lula Burns, license dated 10 Nov 1898 and marriage dated 23 Nov 1898 in Brooks County, Georgia
• Military evidence: headstone application for William H. Pace Sr., Private, Company E, 29th Battalion Georgia Cavalry

The 1900 Barney household shows William Pace as a sixty-two-year-old Georgia-born farmer living with his much younger wife Lula and their infant daughter Selma. The census states that he owned his farm free of mortgage. Selma's age is recorded as 5/12, so the earlier draft's reading as "12-May" was wrong.

William's earlier record trail is now much clearer than the older entry allowed. In 1850 he appears in Harris County, Georgia, in the household of an older Pace family headed by a man whose given name is difficult to read in the surviving image, alongside Nancy H. Pace. By 1860 he was in Muscogee County as William H. Pace, age twenty-three, and his marriage to Susan Foster on 8 June 1858 in Muscogee County is directly documented. The 1870 and 1880 censuses place William and Susan in Muscogee County, not Brooks County, so the older timeline moved the family into Brooks too early.

The first marriage is supported by more than the marriage record alone. A 1932 death certificate for William and Susan's daughter Willie Bee Milton names her parents as William H. Pace and Susan Foster and gives Harris County, Georgia, as her birthplace. That record strengthens both the first-marriage identification and the family's earlier Harris County connection.

A Brooks County marriage license and certificate show William H. Pace marrying Miss Lula Burns in November 1898, with the ceremony performed on 23 November 1898. That record anchors the later household in 1900 and corrects the earlier draft's later date for the marriage. By 1910 William H. Pace was still in Barney with Lula, and the household included children Eula and Emmett.

The 1870 Daily Columbus Enquirer notice for the estate of Clement Pace adds useful family context. It shows William H. Pace acting as administrator in a Harris County estate sale. The clipping supports his place within the older Pace network, though it does not by itself prove the exact relationship between William and Clement Pace.

William's Confederate service now rests on firmer ground than the earlier entry showed. A military index entry points to a Georgia cavalry record, and a later government headstone application identifies William H. Pace Sr. as a Private in Company E, 29th Battalion Georgia Cavalry, buried at Gornto Cemetery in Brooks County. The application was filed by his daughter Eulalie P. Taylor, which helps tie the veteran record to the same family.

Find A Grave memorials for William Henry Pace Sr., Susan A. Pace, and Lula E. Burns Gary support the burial place, spouse sequence, and later family structure. They are useful supporting records here, especially where they line up with census, marriage, military, and death-certificate evidence. They should not carry the argument by themselves.

The Revolutionary War claim in the older entry appears to come from DAR lineage material and related derivative compilations that identify Susan Foster as daughter of John L. S. Foster and trace that line back to Sgt. John Foster of Virginia. That is enough to explain the origin of the claim, but the present record stack still supports treating it as lineage-book evidence rather than as a fully proved direct-record chain.

Military Service

William H. Pace Sr.'s Confederate service is supported by a military index entry and a government headstone application identifying him as a private in Company E, 29th Battalion Georgia Cavalry. The headstone application was filed by daughter Eulalie P. Taylor and places him at Gornto Cemetery, tying the military evidence back to this family.

Open Research Questions

• William's exact death date should be checked against a direct death record or probate record; the memorial material and the military-marker paperwork do not appear to agree perfectly on the year.
• Susan A. Foster Pace's death should be supported by a direct death or burial record beyond memorial material.
• Lula E. Burns Gary Pace's death should also be supported by a direct death or burial record if the entry is pushed further.
• The exact relationship between William H. Pace and Clement Pace remains unproved from the newspaper notice alone.
• The Buck Pace and Bailiff Pace newspaper references are useful local leads only. Do not attach either article to this household as proved family evidence unless a direct identity bridge is found.
• The Revolutionary War descent through the Foster line should remain cautiously stated unless a fuller proof chain is assembled from direct records.
• Selma Pace is securely present in the 1900 household as an infant, but her later life and exact parentage context have not yet been pushed further here.

Research Status

Well-researched but not source-exhausted. The household now has a solid census backbone from 1850 through 1910, direct records for both marriages, a good military support record, and a child death certificate that reinforces the first family structure. The main remaining work is in death-record tightening, the Clement Pace probate context, and the deeper proof chain for the Foster Revolutionary War claim.

Sources

• 1850 U.S. census, Harris County, Georgia, household including William Pace and older Pace family members.
• 1860 U.S. census, Muscogee County, Georgia, household of William H. Pace and Susan Pace.
• Muscogee County, Georgia, marriage record for William H. Pace and Susan Foster, 8 Jun 1858.
• 1870 U.S. census, Columbus, Muscogee County, Georgia, household of William Pace and Susan Pace.
• Daily Columbus Enquirer (Columbus, Georgia), 15 Jul 1870, administrator's sale notice for the estate of Clement Pace, signed by William H. Pace as administrator.
• The Valdosta Times (Valdosta, Georgia), 21 May 1901, "A Gruesome Discovery," reprinted from the Quitman Free Press; mentions "Bailiff Pace at Barney" in the Eli/Dave Dodson body-found account.
• The Macon Telegraph (Macon, Georgia), 26 Aug 1903; user-supplied PDF of the Little River/Cecil monster or inland sea-serpent story naming "Buck Pace of Barney."
• Savannah Morning News (Savannah, Georgia), 29 Aug 1903; user-supplied PDF of the same Little River/Cecil monster or inland sea-serpent story naming "Buck Pace of Barney."
• The Valdosta Times (Valdosta, Georgia), 29 Aug 1903; user-supplied PDF of the same Little River/Cecil monster or inland sea-serpent story naming "Buck Pace of Barney."
• 1880 U.S. census, Nances, Muscogee County, Georgia, household of William Pace and Susan Pace.
• Brooks County, Georgia, marriage license and certificate for William H. Pace and Lula Burns, license dated 10 Nov 1898 and marriage dated 23 Nov 1898.
• 1900 U.S. census, Barney, Brooks County, Georgia, household of William Pace and Lula E. Pace, including infant Selma Pace.
• 1910 U.S. census, Barney, Brooks County, Georgia, household of William H. Pace and Lula Pace, including Eula and Emmett Pace.
• Military index entry for William M. Pace, Georgia Confederate service, used as supporting military evidence.
• Government headstone application for William H. Pace Sr., identifying service as Private, Company E, 29th Battalion Georgia Cavalry, with burial at Gornto Cemetery and application by daughter Eulalie P. Taylor.
• Georgia death certificate for Willie Bee Milton, died 6 Jun 1932, naming parents William H. Pace and Susan Foster.
• Find A Grave memorial #51988457 for William Henry Pace Sr.
• Find A Grave memorial #51988444 for Susan A. Pace.
• Find A Grave memorial #110913838 for Lula E. Burns Gary.
• DAR lineage material and related derivative compilations identifying Susan Foster as daughter of John L. S. Foster and tracing the line to Sgt. John Foster, used as secondary evidence for the Revolutionary War claim.

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